WORD, DEED & SPIRIT A l T i z on
On Novels, Music, and Holistic Ministry
got lost. What a travesty! Something is not right when we allow the creative, artistic side of ourselves to lie dormant in the name of ministry preparation, because I’m convinced that effective ministry requires as much empathy and creativity as it does intellect and strategy. Both the artistic and analytical sides of the brain need to be firing on all cylinders if I recently finished reading Sara Paretsky’s we want to do ministry well.This is espeFire Sale, a novel that, on four different cially true of holistic ministry, because occasions, happened to place Ron Sider’s what it takes to integrate word and deed book Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger —as well as to get church and commuin the possession of the story’s protagonist. nity on the same page—is the ability to By implication, Ron’s book was one of think outside the box, to take risks, and the forces that made the “good guy” to meet unpredictable challenges that the good guy. For a bestselling mystery invariably emerge. It takes this kind of novelist to use Rich Christians in this innovation because no effort in commuway testifies to the unpredictably strange nity transformation is exactly transferrable and wonderful places that Sider’s book from one place to another. Furthermore, has found itself since its publication it takes a creative, human approach to develop meaningful, purposeful friendin 1977. While this fact alone warrants column space, what I really want to share here is that I read a novel—you know, a book with character development, creative license, and a plot instead of principles, methodologies, and a thousand footnotes. Moreover, right after finishing Fire Sale, I picked up another novel—Susan Howatch’s Absolute Truths, which chron- ships across cultural and class boundaries, icles the life of fictional bishop Charles an essential skill for effective holistic Ashworth—and I’m enjoying it immensely. ministry. Further still, an inventive, artistic (Who knew that the Church of England outlook is what enables us to experience in the 1960s could have had so much steady joy in the often hard work of drama?) I discovered midway through this transformational ministry. Based upon the recent rejuvenation one that it is the last in a six-book series, so I plan to go back to the first and read of my right brain, I would say that readthe series all the way through. And my ing fiction develops this essential creativity in a way that no airtight argument, set cup runneth over. Please excuse this seemingly out-of- of principles, or surefire strategy can do. place excitement, but understand that Creativity—that which engages story, prior to these books I hadn’t picked up appreciates beauty, thinks unconventionanything marked “fiction” for years. I’ve ally, and sees the human face of issues been too busy reading “serious books” in and problems—is needed if we are to theology, sociology, anthropology, eccle- present the whole gospel (at once a prosiology, and missiology, as the pursuit of foundly simple and beautifully complex ministry degrees necessitated an outra- thing) in a desperately lost and drab geous quantity of scholarly reading. And world. So I hope to practice what I preach along the way, the ability to engage fiction here and maintain a steady diet of mys-
tery, science fiction, and whatever else stimulates the creative impulses within. Music has also served me in this way, but unlike novels, I’ve never allowed it to recede from my life. Music has always kept me dancing and singing, and it has enabled me to go about life as a minister with heart.Whether it’s putting on a Bob Dylan record after a hard day’s work or picking up a guitar and writing a song, music has kept me emotionally alive, inspiring me to love, act, think, cry, and care. Indeed, without music I’m not sure if I would still be engaged in holistic ministry today. To be sure, brilliant books like Rich Christians may have catapulted me to try to make a difference, but without the “holistic ministry soundtrack”— whether the existential angst of Mark Heard or the quirky voice of Victoria Williams or the magical harmonies of the Indigo Girls or the divine inspira-
Something is not right when we allow the creative, artistic side of ourselves to lie dormant in the name of ministry preparation...
PRISM 2009
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tion of U2 or, more recently, the rockin’ ukulele of Jake Shimabukuro—I’m honestly not sure I could have kept the momentum going. If this meditation makes no sense, or you find it just a little too touchy-feely, perhaps it is time to put your favorite CD on and cuddle up with a good novel, or to do whatever it takes to get your own creative juices flowing. For I believe the needy and broken whom we serve will greatly benefit if we are in touch with that which enables us to see beauty in the ashes, hope amidst despair, and redemption from the ruins. n Al Tizon is director of ESA’s Word & Deed Network and assistant professor of holistic ministry at Palmer Theological Seminary in Wynnewood, Pa.